3:18 There 1 the prisoners 2 relax 3 together; 4
they do not hear the voice of the oppressor. 5
10:11 You clothed 6 me with skin and flesh
and knit me together 7 with bones and sinews.
21:26 Together they lie down in the dust,
and worms cover over them both.
24:4 They turn the needy from the pathway,
and the poor of the land hide themselves together. 8
30:7 They brayed 9 like animals among the bushes
and were huddled together 10 under the nettles.
31:38 “If my land cried out against me 12
and all its furrows wept together,
34:15 all flesh would perish together
and human beings would return to dust.
38:38 when the dust hardens 13 into a mass,
and the clumps of earth stick together?
40:13 Hide them in the dust 14 together,
imprison 15 them 16 in the grave. 17
41:15 Its back 18 has rows of shields,
shut up closely 19 together as with a seal;
1 tn “There” is not in the Hebrew text, but is supplied from the context.
2 tn The LXX omits the verb and translates the noun not as prisoners but as “old men” or “men of old time.”
3 tn The verb שַׁאֲנָנוּ (sha’ananu) is the Pilpel of שָׁאַן (sha’an) which means “to rest.” It refers to the normal rest or refreshment of individuals; here it is contrasted with the harsh treatment normally put on prisoners.
4 sn See further J. C. de Moor, “Lexical Remarks Concerning yahad and yahdaw,” VT 7 (1957): 350-55.
5 tn Or “taskmaster.” The same Hebrew word is used for the taskmasters in Exod 3:7.
6 tn The skin and flesh form the exterior of the body and so the image of “clothing” is appropriate. Once again the verb is the prefixed conjugation, expressing what God did.
7 tn This verb is found only here (related nouns are common) and in the parallel passage of Ps 139:13. The word סָכַךְ (sakhakh), here a Poel prefixed conjugation (preterite), means “to knit together.” The implied comparison is that the bones and sinews form the tapestry of the person (compare other images of weaving the life).
8 sn Because of the violence and oppression of the wicked, the poor and needy, the widows and orphans, all are deprived of their rights and forced out of the ways and into hiding just to survive.
9 tn The verb נָהַק (nahaq) means “to bray.” It has cognates in Arabic, Aramaic, and Ugaritic, so there is no need for emendation here. It is the sign of an animal’s hunger. In the translation the words “like animals” are supplied to clarify the metaphor for the modern reader.
10 tn The Pual of the verb סָפַח (safakh, “to join”) also brings out the passivity of these people – “they were huddled together” (E. Dhorme, Job, 434).
11 sn Many commentators place vv. 38-40b at the end of v. 34, so that there is no return to these conditional clauses after his final appeal.
12 sn Some commentators have suggested that the meaning behind this is that Job might not have kept the year of release (Deut 15:1), and the law against mixing seed (Lev 19:19). But the context will make clear that the case considered is obtaining the land without paying for it and causing the death of its lawful owner (see H. H. Rowley, Job [NCBC], 206). Similar to this would be the case of Naboth’s vineyard.
13 tn The word means “to flow” or “to cast” (as in casting metals). So the noun developed the sense of “hard,” as in cast metal.
14 tn The word “dust” can mean “ground” here, or more likely, “grave.”
15 tn The verb חָבַשׁ (khavash) means “to bind.” In Arabic the word means “to bind” in the sense of “to imprison,” and that fits here.
16 tn Heb “their faces.”
17 tn The word is “secret place,” the place where he is to hide them, i.e., the grave. The text uses the word “secret place” as a metonymy for the grave.
18 tc The MT has גַּאֲוָה (ga’avah, “his pride”), but the LXX, Aquila, and the Vulgate all read גַּוּוֹ (gavvo, “his back”). Almost all the modern English versions follow the variant reading, speaking about “his [or its] back.”
19 tn Instead of צָר (tsar, “closely”) the LXX has צֹר (tsor, “stone”) to say that the seal was rock hard.